Jason Statham is not your average action star. He has that square jaw and serious look that would have made him a household name in the era of Steve McQueen, but with the 'everyday hero' taking off in the new millennium, Statham hasn't really broken through like he should in the States. (He's much bigger in the rest of the world.) Instead, Statham has carved out an incredibly consistent niche of macho action characters from The Transporter to Crank. Even in straight-to-video fare like the recently released Chaos, Jason Statham rarely fails to deliver. He's getting some of the best early reviews of his career for Roger Donaldson's The Bank Job, an action thriller based on a famous 1971 heist that opens this Friday. He sat down at a press conference recently to tell us about his character, his celebrity status in the U.K., and even working again with the director who gave him his big break, Guy Ritchie.
Jason Statham on how much he remembers about the real life robbery:
"We didn’t know much about it. I mean it’s a little...1971, I was barely on the planet at that period of time. So the fact that there was a D notice that was issued and I think there was like three days of press, each day was progressively more, leaning towards, you know the exposure of what was happening in and around the bank. On day four there was no further coverage in any of the newspapers, so for thirty odd years no one has really known anything about the robbery."
"Now when Roger decided to take on the movie, he’s a great man of research, so his learning of what happened in an around that time was as much to me and all of my friends. When I was telling them...I’d get newspaper cuttings, the police evidence pictures from inside the vault, from inside the handbag shop where they put all of the..., how big the tunnel was, where they threw all of the earth. So every night I’d go home with new information about the robbery and my mates are going, ‘yeah, yeah I’ll ask my dad about it’. And they said they remembered vaguely something in and around it, but no one really knew about it. It’s been sort of completely blanketed and I think a lot of people from back then will be glad to know what really happened, even if they could remember a robbery at all from the Lloyds Bank. I think it’s a great story that needed telling, but I can’t remember much. So preparing for the film was a bit of an education for me and all of my friends."
Statham on his character in the film:
"I think he’s doing this for his family, you know. I think he is a good person. Okay he’s got a side of him that...let’s say a darker side of him, well not really a dark side. Let’s just say that desperate men do desperate things and I think there is an innocence as much as there is a criminal side to Terry. I mean he’s just wanted to make a better life for himself and the family. I think if anyone is given an opportunity to do that, if you look at your circumstances, people try it all different ways. They go to Vegas and try to make a better life for themselves on a stupid slot machine. Are they respectable people? Some think yes and some think no. I mean the world is full of bad things that go on behind curtains and closed doors. And if you think that Terry is a bad person I could show you a lot of people who run around in suits and ties and put on this big front, top show about how respectable they are and they’ve got more seedy, dirty habits than you could possibly imagine."
"The fact that this guy is given an opportunity to rob a bank and you know they’re not stealing from the poor. They’re robbing a bank that contains...they’re basically robbing a safe deposit vault and the people that have these safety deposit boxes usually keep within them things they don’t want people to know about. A lot of things that are in these deposit boxes are illicit earnings anyway, there’s a lot of bad stuff, jewels that have been stolen, there’s money that doesn’t belong to people. So these boxes that they’re robbing, not to say we’re allowed to go steal that stuff, I’m not trying to dilute it and make it a justifiable act, but we’re not going in there with machine guns and balaclavas and hurting people. We’re doing something against the law, yes, but basically who is the law here? MI5 are trying to create a robbery themselves to protect their bad stuff and I think...the catch phrase is, ‘we’re the most innocent people involved’ and I think on this occasion we are."
On dealing with his celebrity status in the UK:
"I ain’t that popular, believe me. People are a bit more reserved back in the UK, you know, they’re not running around with pens and papers. Every now and then you get the odd fan here and there. So, yeah, I think it’s cool to make a film in the UK, some people give you props now and again. But it’s not like I’m Brad Pitt or Tom Cruise, I mean they’ve got problems."(laughs)
On the intelligence of Terry and his crew:
"That was a question I was sort of asking, cause I know a few crooks and crims from my earlier days, not that I’ve ever been involved with that kind of stuff...I used to sell perfume and jewelry in my own little way and it’s not like I sold stolen goods. But I do know different levels of crooks and criminals and I’ve met quite a few of them. Most of them don’t necessarily look like Dave and Steve the photographer, but you know what, there’s always a surprise. I’ve recently met someone who went to prison for a long time and you could never pigeon hole him as a guy who would do something against the law or would end up inside, so there’s always a surprise. They don’t have to look like Al Capone to be worthy of doing something against the law."
Statham on working with Guy Richie again:
"I’d love to work with Guy again, absolutely. Whenever he’s got the script he wants me involved with I will certainly be jumping up and down. I mean I can’t say no to him, I love him as a filmmaker, I love his style, I love his tastes, we’re good friends, we work well together, f**k yeah I’d jump at the chance."
And Vinnie Jones:
(laughs) "Vin’s and old friend of mine, we haven’t worked together for many years now. We live very close by and if we can do something and if Guy wants to direct it, great."
Jason Statham on future projects:
"Brazilian Job has just been out there in the stratosphere for quite some time and if that happens I’ll be very surprised. But I’m very happy to work with Mark and everybody and would love to do it, but it just doesn’t look realistic. Crank 2 is definitely happening, I’m going to throw myself around the streets of L.A. once more with the delightful Amy Smart and the mad Neveldine and Taylor. And I’m just about to go do Transporter 3 over in Paris with Luc Besson, so I’m preparing physically now with a very strict regime from six in the morning until mid-day every day."
-- Jordan RiefeOriginal here
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